


Smoke

by Twyd



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Angst, Apocalypse, Developing Relationship, Dystopia, End of the World, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff, Illnesses, M/M, Madness, Pre-Slash, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-22
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-04-26 08:04:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14397804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twyd/pseuds/Twyd
Summary: When a gang war goes wrong, a gas leak causes Ikebukuro to burn, with its remaining, un-evacuated inhabitants losing their minds. Except for Shizuo, of course, with his superior immune system. Izaya is one such inhabitant who has been left behind. What’s Shizuo supposed to do?





	Smoke

As flames lick the last of his apartment building, Shizuo tells himself not to panic. Even if he hasn’t seen another coherent soul for hours, even if the air is still thick with smoke, the city deathly silent underneath the flames, panicking will not help.

He’d pushed his friends and everyone else into the evacuation vans until they were full, not wanting to take up space he didn’t need, but now he is starting to regret that decision. Shouldn’t someone have come back for him by now? Not that he knows how long it had been. All phones, TV and electricity seems to have been wiped out, at approximately the time everyone started panicking.

But _he_ mustn’t panic. His surroundings may look like a dystopian comic book, but emergency services, government aid, hell the army could be on their way for all he knows.

Shizuo takes out his phone automatically, is reminded by the black screen that it is dead. He remembers seeing it on the news this morning: a gang fight somehow involving dangerous gas, to stay away from the area, that the evacuations were just a precaution. How the hell could it escalate into this?

He steps back from some falling debris of his old building. He thought he would have seen a helicopter by now. Several helicopters, in fact. Maybe it was the smoke. Could helicopters fly through all that smoke? Probably not. But, the government or whoever would be doing _something_ , he just had to sit tight. He could probably walk to safety, only he doesn’t know which direction to go in, and he can sense that in some areas the level is strong enough to distort even him. He would shoot himself before that happens. If _he_ went mad, literally, zombie-mad the way he had seen the others, there would be nothing left of the city. The authorities would have to shoot him if he didn’t do it to himself.

Shizuo shakes his head. He’s being stupid. It probably looks far worse than it actually is. And Celty is probably cruising around looking for people. She’ll probably check out his street soon.

Shizuo waits for what it feels like an hour, and is probably more like 15 minutes. The smell of gas is getting stronger. It could be his imagination, but he’s not taking any chances.

He walks aimlessly, away from the stench. He wants to find a clock that works, a TV in a store window, an electronic billboard, but all the screens are wiped. It really is as if there’s been an apocalypse.

 _Don’t think like that_ , he chides. _There will be some explanation for all of this. You’ll look back and feel stupid for freaking out._

His thoughts break off as cleanly as if he’d been struck. Izaya is standing a little distance away, surveying what’s left of the city. There is something odd about the way he’s standing. Shizuo wonders if Izaya had something to do with all this, but the thought drifts away as unimportant, at least for now.

Shizuo represses his usual instinct to hurl something at him. Shinjuku had been where it all started, after all. Izaya could be sick as well. There is something _not right_ with the way he’s standing, so much so that Shizuo thinks he may somehow be dead on his feet.

The informant doesn’t turn, even when Shizuo knows he must be able to hear him.

“Izaya…?”

The informant cocks his head to show he’s listening. This makes him uneasy. Izaya would never knowingly keep his back turned to Shizuo.

“Are you all right?” Shizuo asks cautiously.

He does move then, slowly, turning in a zombie like half circle to look at Shizuo. His face is completely blank. The shred of hope is crushed as Shizuo looks at him. He doesn’t look deranged, but Shizuo knows Izaya, knows every expression he has, and this isn’t one of them.

“You have to come away,” Shizuo tells him, in a voice he’d use on a child. “The gas is worse here.”

And it is, Shizuo can smell it creeping up on them. It will affect even him if he stays here much longer. What will he do if it just follows him until he’s surrounded on all sides? Surely help will have come by then?

“I’m not going anywhere,” Izaya tells him.

Shizuo frowns.

“You have to,” he says.

Izaya has already turned back to the fires, smiling.

“I’m not being corny, but there is something really beautiful about burning cities, don’t you think?” He doesn’t sound crazy now. He sounds like himself, which is somehow worse. “Just a little gas attack too, and this is it. End of the world. Maybe that was all it needed.”

Izaya looks even worse on closer inspection. His skin is black in places, his hair and clothes in tatters. He looks as if he’s physically beaten his way out of a fire. Shizuo wonders how long he’d been wandering around for.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he repeats.

“I’m not going to hurt you, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Shizuo growls. “I have way more important things to worry about.”

Something occurs to Shizuo then, something that may be causing Izaya’s behaviour.

“Do you- did someone you know get hurt?”

 _Please not his sisters_ , he thinks, although the school had been one of the first places that were evacuated, so they should be fine. Izaya’s secretary, perhaps. Someone else in his life that Shizuo doesn’t even know about.

Izaya doesn’t speak for some time. When he does, he says,

“Your brother’s dead.”

Something awful shudders inside Shizuo.

“You’re lying,” he says, and Izaya must be, but he can’t shake the feeling now the seed is planted.

Izaya turns back to him with a sick, mock-sympathetic smile. Whether he’s lying or not, he sure is enjoying himself.

Shizuo grits his teeth. If he needs to keep his temper at any time of his life, this is it. For all he knows, Izaya is antagonising him just to make him leave him here, and Shizuo won’t be responsible for that.

“You need to get out of here, Izaya.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“You’re going, if I have to fucking drag you myself.”

They fight. If you could call it that. Izaya’s reflexes are dulled, so he’s more of a nuisance than an outright menace. Shizuo easily disarms him of his knives, but Izaya kicks, twists, struggles, drags his feet, even bites when Shizuo tries to drag or carry him. This goes on until something snaps inside Shizuo, and he brings his fist down on the back of Izaya’s head and knocks him out.

He had been careful, but he checks Izaya’s pulse anyway, breathing out when he finds its steady rhythm. Then he heaves the limp informant over his shoulder and carries him back to Ikebukuro. The irony is not lost on him.

He carries Izaya all the way to Yoyogi Park, where the air is clearer, and Shizuo figures it would be easier for a helicopter to spot them out in the open. He dumps Izaya and sits on the grass beside him to wait.

Izaya comes to a little later, groaning.

“Where are we?”

“Yoyogi Park.”

Izaya sits up and glares at him. For a moment he almost looks like his old self.

“I’m going back.”

“You’re fucking not.”

Izaya stands, and Shizuo tackles him around the legs to bring him back down. They wrestle again. Izaya refuses to be still.  He won’t respond to violence, threats or pleas, so in the end Shizuo snaps the chains off the nearby swingset and ties Izaya to a tree.

Izaya laughs at this, high-pitched and hysterical.

“You think this is kinder than letting me go back? Tying me up for birds or rats to pick at me? Shizu-chan is even more of a monster than I thought.”

“I’m not leaving you,” Shizuo growls. “But I can’t keep knocking you out every few hours - much as I’d _like_ to - and I can’t let you wander off when you’re sick.”

Izaya glares at him, the mirth vanishing from his face.

“I’ll kill you.”

Shizuo has a hard time believing that this is just the gas talking.

“You can’t keep me tied up forever. Next opportunity I get I’m going to kill you slowly, and then you can be with your dear brother again.”

“Shut up, Izaya,” Shizuo growls. “Help will be here in a minute.”

Izaya laughs again, a high pitched, horrible sound.

“What help, Shizu-chan? There’s no helicopters, no sirens, nothing. It’ll be even more of an embarrassment for the government if they find survivors in the state they’re in. No-one is coming for us. We didn’t evacuate in time so that’s it. They’ll probably blow the area up.”

Shizuo tries to ignore him.

They wait for help.

Izaya hums tunelessly, sings, makes as much noise with the chains as possible, insults Shizuo, goads him about his brother, and for the first time he can’t get a rise out of him. It’s just noise. Shizuo keeps his eyes trained to the distance and the sky.

“When was the last time you saw someone?” he asks Izaya, raising his voice over his nonsense.

“Your brother,” he sings back, and Shizuo doesn’t bother asking him anything else. He is becoming more and more convinced that Izaya is only pretending to be crazy.

“No-one’s coming, Shizu-chan,” he says then, more seriously than before. “We can’t stay out here all night.”

Shizuo knows he’s right. It’s already getting cold. But he refuses to believe that no-one’s coming for them.

“My apartment burned down,” he argues lamely.

“Sunshine City,” Izaya harps. “That thing could survive anything.”

Shizuo turns his head to the building reluctantly.

At least there would be food, and supplies, and they could see everything from the observation deck.

“All right.”

Izaya is still being insane, so Shizuo keeps the chains around his wrists and pulls Izaya along, ignoring his complaints.

The automatic doors slide apart to welcome them, as if this were a regular day.

“How can the electricity be working?” Shizuo wonders out loud.

“They must have a backup generator.”

“But how do _they_ work?”

“No idea.”

Shizuo’s not complaining.

He drags Izaya along past all the brightly lit stores. They pass a store for literally everything they might need. Not that Shizuo thinks it will be long before they’re rescued, but still, he has to admit this was a good idea.

“There’s our bedroom,” Izaya says, nodding to a department store window, a luxury king sized bed, comforting in the bright store lights.

“No,” Shizuo says, jerking him back. “We’re sleeping on the observation deck floor so we can keep an eye out. We’ll bring blankets and things up.”

Izaya whines at this, but Shizuo ignores him and drags him along.

The observation deck however presents another problem. The elevator. No-one could help them if it gets stuck. They’d die of thirst in that tiny space. Shizuo dithers, and risks it anyway. He’s exhausted.

To his dismay, there is no view of the city when they get up there: all is just smoke.

“Well, this was a swell idea,” Izaya remarks.

“Shut up,” he says, giving Izaya a shove.

He leaves Izaya tied up up there, and brings food, bottled water,  bedding, torches, batteries, first aid kit, cigarettes and matches. It feels wrong, helping himself, but the world would understand, if it ever came back for them.

“Like building a nest,” Izaya tells him, surveying his loot. “Not bad, is it? We have a terrific view. You could have brought books, the latest Apple Macs, a widescreen TV. But there’s no rush,  I suppose. We’ll be here for a while.”

Shizuo lets him chatter on. He knows they have enough to survive for a long time, but he doesn’t want to think about that.

His phone still won’t switch on. The electricity works, but the radios and TVs are just static.

“Someone will come eventually,” Shizuo keeps saying, for his own benefit as much as Izaya’s.

“Probably cannibals.”

“Shut up.”

“Government’s probably cut us off,” Izaya harps. “Like I say, this is embarrassing for a first world country. They’ll probably kill all survivors, tidy the city and play the whole thing down.”

“This isn’t North Korea,” Shizuo growls.

“It could be though, couldn’t it?”

Izaya doesn’t eat. Shizuo can’t be bothered forcing him. He looks even worse in the mall’s overbright lights. He sees Shizuo looking at him and seems to see himself for the first time, and  insists on getting new clothes.

“And a shower. Which I assume you’ll unchain me for, unless you have some kinks I don’t know about.”

They use the mall showers to clean up, stealing toiletries from the stores.

“I always thought you’d be a good person to be in a crisis with,” Shizuo grumbles, when he’s had to wrestle Izaya back in chains. “You’re fucking useless.”

“You’ve thought about being in a crisis with me? How sweet,” he says, licking an ice pop, the only food he’d deigned to unwrap. “I on the other hand always thought you’d be terrible in a crisis. Funny old world.”

The lights are apparently on a timer, as they go off around midnight.

Shizuo insists on keeping Izaya’s chains on while they sleep, but he clangs them incessantly for hours until Shizuo’s afraid his restraint will snap, and he’ll end up strangling him with them.

“Please stop,” Shizuo begs.

“I can’t sleep with them on,” Izaya says, clanging away.

Shizuo rips them off, nearly breaking Izaya’s arms in the process.

“Go anywhere and I’ll kill you. I mean it. I'll break your fucking legs if I have to.”

Izaya is smirking, eyebrows raised.

“That’s my Shizu-chan. I knew you were in there somewhere.”

He stays in his blanket nest however, choosing to listen to Shizuo for once.

Just before they sleep, he reaches out and puts a hand on Shizuo’s leg.

“If I had a womb we could repopulate the Earth.”

“Well, you don’t,” Shizuo says roughly, shaking him off.

They don’t speak again that night.

-

The sun rises and sets on another day, and no-one comes. 24 hours. Shizuo tries to tell himself this is not significant.

Izaya lounges around reading books he’d helped himself too, and occasionally mocks Shizuo or bitches about something. He disappears at some point - Shizuo has no idea if he’s leaving or committing suicide and doesn’t care - and comes back with two steaming cups.

“Kimura Coffee is the best,” he says, holding out a cup.

Shizuo smacks his arm and sends it flying.

“They do milkshakes too,” Izaya says reproachfully, shaking coffee off his sleeve.

Shizuo ignores him and goes to sit by the window, but Izaya follows and squashes up beside him.

Shizuo wants to keep ignoring him, but he’s desperate to talk to someone, even if it’s Izaya and he’s half cracked.

“Aren’t you scared?”

“Of what?” Izaya says. “Dying? Not any more.”

“But aren’t you upset?”

“What are _you_ upset about? What does Shizu-chan have to live for?”

“...my friends,” he mumbles, even though he knows he shouldn’t encourage Izaya. “My family. Other people. What about you? What do you live for?”

“Other people as well,” he says, as contentedly as if they were planning a holiday.

“Which people? Your sisters? Shinra?”

“All of them. All people.”

Shizuo gives up.

“How long do you think we’ll be here?”

“Forever, I expect,” Izaya says idly. “Unless there _is_ life outside the city and they’ve quarantined us. Then they might come back to shoot us, or maybe just blow the whole area up. No survivors.”

Shizuo says nothing.

“Rats will get in eventually, anyway.” Izaya is saying. “They’ll finish off the perishable food. Do you have any idea how fast they breed? Sooner or later their food will run out, and then they’ll smell us.”

“Shut up,” Shizuo growls.

Izaya gives up and goes to sleep. Shizuo doesn’t, and that’s when he finds it happening, Izaya scratching himself in his sleep, deep clawing into his own arms as if he were trying to destroy himself.

Shizuo shakes him, but he won’t wake up properly, stares at Shizuo without really seeing him, and it's more terrifying than the fires and the silence. He considers tying Izaya up again, but he doesn’t think this will stop him from hurting himself if he really wants to.

“Jesus Christ,” Shizuo says when Izaya starts clawing himself again, almost crying with exhaustion. “Stop it. _Stop it.”_

He manages to stop Izaya with his own body, holding him in a parody of a lover, until Izaya seems to exhaust himself and falls asleep.

Izaya remembers nothing in the morning, regards his arms and the circles under Shizuo’s eyes with dull surprise.

“I believe it. I can sort of tell something’s going wrong with me,” he says.

He lets Shizuo clean him up. Not that Shizuo gives him a choice. The last thing he needs is Izaya getting some kind of infection.

These catatonic trances, the scratches, come and go over the next few days, were he won’t eat or speak, and fights Shizuo like a cat when he tries to help him.

“Why are you doing this?” Shizuo snarls in frustration. “Do you want me to kill you that badly?”

Izaya just smiles his twisted, pitying smile.

“You should have left me.”

He fucking should have.

-

It feels like a month, when it’s probably been nothing like this. Izaya has been fairly lucid all day. He has showered and shaved and helped himself to another armful of books.

Shizuo on the other hand is having a bad day, something Izaya is annoyingly perceptive of without him having to say anything.

“Shizu-chan should read a book,” Izaya says without looking up, as Shizuo paces the observation deck window. The smoke still hasn’t cleared, but neither of them mention relocating to a lower floor. “He might learn something.”

“I can’t concentrate.”

“I can pick you out a nice picture book,” Izaya says, flipping a page of his own book. “Seriously. Go to one of the record shops and put some music on. Learn a new language in the bookstore. There are worse places to be than a mall. That reminds me. I got you a present.

Shizuo waits while Izaya digs around in his stolen shopping bags, that mostly appear to contain books. He eventually produces two Hello Kitty walkie-talkies.

“Because our phones aren’t working,” he explains, grinning. “I’ve already put batteries in.”

“But what’s the range?” Shizuo asks. He takes a pink handset as if it may bite him. The kitty stares back at him innocently.

“Up to four miles,” Izaya says cheerfully.

Shizuo has to admit this is a good call. Just in case one of them happens to break a leg or something when they go ‘shopping.’

“So go take a walk or something,” Izaya says, already going back to his book. “I’ll have Hello Kitty if I need you.”

Shizuo tries, but it’s worse being on his own.

He brings back a few books, flicks through them without really getting anywhere. The sun sets on their longest day yet.

“Your brother’s not dead,” Izaya says suddenly.

Shizuo’s aware that this could be the lie, a far crueller one. He can’t keep up with Izaya’s moods and intentions, his lucidity and his madness.

“Good to know.”

“My sisters are, though.”

The air in the room thickens. Shizuo doesn’t say anything for a long time.

That night is colder than the others. Shizuo can’t figure out how to control the heating in the control room, and he’s too scared of fucking something up if he presses too many buttons.

They get extra blankets, but they sleep closer anyway.

-

Shizuo gives in and cries the next night. He tries to stay quiet, but Izaya presses up against him from behind and puts his arms around him.

“It’ll be OK, Shizu-chan.”

“Help me think of something,” he sobs. “You're the fucking smart one. Tell me what to do.”

Izaya thinks for a minute.

“I would bring up more food. Tinned stuff. Sooner or later rats really are going to descend on the food down there, and it'll all go off anyway and the smell will become unbearable. Find a control room and shut the main doors, in case strays or lunatics get in. If you can figure out how to get on the roof, and if the air is safe, see if there’s a store that does flare guns, or some way of writing some on the roof. You know, how they do in movies. This is all worse case scenario, by the way. Someone could come.”

“Do _you_ think someone will come?”

“This is Tokyo, I don't think we can be wiped off the radar quite so easily. Assuming this isn't spreading all over the nation and the world, which is unlikely. I reckon we're making headline news right now. They could be covering the whole city systematically and just haven't got to us yet, especially if they haven't dealt with this kind of gas before, which they obviously haven't.”

“What happened, though? Evil mastermind in a kid gang? How could that happen?”

“An evil mastermind could have given it to them for kicks,” Izaya says. “It wasn't me, though.” He thinks for a minute. “The way I see it, it's relatively easy to produce this kind of gas on a small scale, if you know what you're doing. But if it's not controlled, if it's not filtered correctly, and it's let loose in the city...these days, officials are trained for nuclear weapons, cyber attacks, terrorists, but not this kind of thing. I mean, this happened at 9am this morning, and it was gone 11 before evacuation was underway. Can you imagine? Just two police officers were sent to deal with it initially. _More trouble in Ikebukuro, they thought. Then they went mad, obviously. A lot of things were on fire by then.”_

He seems to realise that he’s not exactly comforting Shizuo, so he shuts up. He strokes Shizuo’s hand instead until his sobs subside. The strokes turn into something more than just comfort.

“Izaya…”

“Please,” he says quietly. “While I’ve still got my senses. I don’t know if I’ll be able to do this again.”

Shizuo is still enclosed in Izaya’s arms. He can feel the heat of his breathing.

He struggles free and gets up, going to pace in front of the window. His dick twitches half-heartedly in his stolen sleep-shorts. Shizuo wills it down, thinking of smoke and fire and the scratches on Izaya’s arms.

Izaya follows him.

“I brought lube up, just in case.”

“Leave me alone, Izaya.”

Izaya steps right in front of him, forcing him to look him in the eye and see that he’s lucid, that he means this.

“Please.”

-

Izaya gets up and showers as normal the next morning, but then goes straight back to bed. He doesn’t look great.

“Did I hurt you?” Shizuo worries. “Was it too rough?”

“It was absolutely perfect, Shizu-chan,” Izaya smiles at him, serene as a nun on her deathbed. “I’m going to take a nap.”

Izaya doesn’t wake up for more than 24 hours. It’s not a coma, he mumbles and shoves at Shizuo whenever he shakes him too roughly, but he won’t get up, won’t open his eyes, won’t speak.

Shizuo tries to find books on gas poisoning, but he’s too overwhelmed by conflicting information. He should have got Izaya to help him with this this days ago. Now Izaya’s going to die, not because of Shizuo’s temper for once but because he’s too fucking stupid to figure out how to save him. He’d been so convinced someone would come to help that he hadn’t been proactive enough about Izaya’s decline, ignoring his slips in lucidity.

_I don’t know if I’ll be able to do this again._

He tries to get Izaya to sip some water through a straw.

“Hey.” He swallows, gives the informant a little shake. “Come on, you’ve slept for almost two days now. Don’t you want to comb your hair? Make me some tea for a change?”

Nothing.

 _“ Please,_ Izaya. I need someone to talk to. We have to help each other through this.”

He tries to think like Izaya. The old Izaya, that is, the one that would treat this like a video game more than real life. He remembers their second day, Izaya climbing around the mall fixtures while laughing at Shizuo, chiding him for not exercising. It feels another lifetime.

“I’m going for a walk,” he tells the prone informant. “Feel free to wake up. I’m on Hello Kitty if you need me.”

Nothing. Shizuo touches his side. His hip bone juts out alarmingly, his stomach concave. Shizuo can’t look at him anymore.

His thoughts don’t stop as he paces the mall like a caged animal. It’s his fault. If he’d made more of an effort to talk to Izaya in the beginning, to earn his trust, rather than chain him up and yell at him and then fuck him without thinking about the consequences, he’s sure that between the two of them they could have figured something out.

He hears something then. His legs shake. It could be a dog, it could be anything, but he takes off running on shaking deer legs even so.

It is the Awakusu-Kai. They are carrying gas masks and medical equipment. Shizuo has to blink to convince himself they’re really here, and even then he doesn’t believe it.

“Heiwajima?”

He can barely speak. He thinks he may faint with relief. He still has the stupid Hello Kitty in his hand, and he clutches it so hard he feels the plastic crumple. They give this a concerned look, as if Shizuo may be deranged.

“What are you doing here?” Shizuo says in a daze.

“Filling in for the government, apparently,” Shiki intones. “Come. We’ll take you somewhere safe.”

“Izaya’s here,” he says, unmoving.

They stiffen.

“Where?”

“On the observation deck. He’s sick.”

Kine splits off from Shiki and Akabayashi, who take his arms.

“Come with us. Kine will take care of Izaya.”

“He’s not well.”

“It’s all right. Kine will help him.”

“You’re not going to kill him, are you?”

“Why on Earth would we do that?” This is Kine who speaks. He heads for the elevators without waiting for a response, breaking into a near jog.

“I’m waiting for him,” Shizuo says to Shiki and Akabayashi, digging his heels in, but he can feel himself getting dizzy even as he speaks. Perhaps the gas is worse down here, or perhaps he’d breathed in too much of it without realising. Their hands come under his arms as he feels his knees finally give way.

-

He wakes in hospital, something he’d been dreamed of so many times that it now seems far more unreal than the Awakusu-Kai had. A nurse smiles at him.

“You’re doing very well.”

A TV plays the news over his bed, with the Prime Minister commending everyone in the district for their bravery. Shizuo watches and still doesn’t understand. He’s as groggy as if he’d been drugged.

Shiki comes after the doctors have finished with him.

“How are you feeling?”

Shizuo ignores this.

“Where’s Izaya?”

“In intensive care. He needs a little more time than you, but he’s going to be fine.”

Shizuo struggles to wake up.

“Is my brother dead?”

“Kasuka? No. I think he’s getting something to eat. He’s been at your side since you arrived.”

“Is anyone dead? What about the people who were infected?”

“Please don’t say infected, it’s not a zombie movie,” Shiki says, pinching the bridge of his nose. “As much as it felt like one at times. There have been fatalities, mostly by the gang members involved, as well as a few police officers. Nearly everyone was evacuated safely, although obviously there were exceptions. Shinra and Celty are all right.” He pauses. “I’m not sure who else you are acquainted with.”

“Are Izaya’s sisters dead?”

“No.” Shiki looks surprised. “The school was one of the first to be evacuated, and it was out of range anyway."

Shizuo struggles to understand.

“Why did no-one _come_? Except for you guys, I mean. We were waiting for helicopters. We were waiting for something, and Izaya was getting worse every day.”

“I don’t know,” Shiki says. “I’m not a government official, I don’t know how they operate. I wouldn’t believe all of what’s on the news at the moment.”

“Izaya kept saying it was the end of the world, that rats would come and eat us.”

Shiki’s lips twitch with what could be a smile.

“Typical informant. Even in a crisis he’s a complete nuisance.”

“Yeah.” Shizuo swallows. “Is he definitely going to be OK?”

“From what I’ve been told. They had taken his IV drips out the last time I looked in on him.” He studies Shizuo. “It was very kind of you to save him.”

“It was very kind of you to save us,” Shizuo says. “Unless you expect…?”

“Of course not,” he says, sounding abhorred at the thought. “We want all our civilians to be safe.”

He pauses.

“I have arranged for the media not to bother you or Izaya. You’re quite the celebrity at the moment, as you can imagine.”

This is reassuring. Shizuo does not want to be broadcast breaking a reporter’s nose.

Then the thought of cameras make him think of something awful. CCTV. The observation deck surely had one.

“What is it?” Shiki asks.

Shizuo agonises, not wanting to tell him, but it would make everything ten times worse if it got out. Even the Yakuza couldn’t protect him from that kind of gossip.

He explains, reddening.

The other’s man’s expression doesn’t change.

“We will take care of that,” he says calmly, as if it involved changing a tyre. “We will wipe the tapes for the period you were there, in all areas of Sunshine City, not just the observation deck. You don’t need to elaborate on your activities.”

“It was just the once!” Shizuo says, mortified. “And I know how it sounds but I wasn’t taking advantage of him, I swear. He- “

“Heiwajima-san.” Shiki’s silky voice slices through his own. “You don’t have to explain yourself. It’s none of my business, nor anyone else’s. And anyway, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. You were two people locked up under duress, and nature took its course.”

He is starting to like Shiki a lot.

The nurse comes back when Shiki is gone, Shizuo points at Izaya on the news and asks her if she knows about him.

She doesn’t need to look at the screen to know who he’s talking about.

“He’s stable.”

Shizuo supposes that’s as good as he can hope for.

He falls asleep just as his brother returns.

-

Shizuo sleeps, eats, sees his brother, his parents, Celty and Shinra and Tom. Watching the news becomes incredibly comforting, the narration, the reporters’ smart clothes. The world is being taken care of again. He’s still not entirely clear on what happened. Some newspapers say the government had deliberately switched off the electricity and cellular networks by accident. Some say it had been part of the attack, that it was more sophisticated than toxic gas. 15 gang members had been arrested.

He and Izaya are both circulating the news, not all of it accurate, but it is reiterated over and over to respect their privacy, and no-one approaches Shizuo for a quote or an interview.

Kasuka tells Shizuo that residents are in temporary housing a few miles from the hospital, where he will be sent when he gets out.

When he’s stronger, he goes for a walk and tries to find Izaya, hearing he’s out of intensive care.

A different nurse frowns when he asks which ward, but, perhaps remembering Shiki’s visit, consents.

“I shouldn’t, you’re not family...five minutes.” And she tells him the ward.

The informant somehow looks worse than he had in Sunshine City, white and frail against the clean sheets and machines. But he is _himself_ again, Shizuo can see that straight away. He looks how Shizuo feels, tired and embarrassed and conflicted.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

Shizuo sits on the bed beside him, ignoring the plastic chair, and Izaya takes hold of his hand. They don’t speak again.

-

Shizuo is discharged faster than he expects. Apparently they need the beds. He is given temporary accommodation with his Ikebukuro neighbours, plus spending money, while the mess is taken care of. He is warned that the accommodation is basic, but it turns out to be bigger than his apartment. There is a fruit basket waiting for him and beer in the fridge, compliments of Shiki. Shizuo is _really_  starting to like the guy now.

He means to visit Izaya in his first few days out, but catching up with Celty, Shinra and Tom, getting a new phone, contacting his insurance company, countless other tasks  exhaust him more than he expected. The doctors and Shinra told him not to overdo it.

When he does make it back to the hospital, he is told that Izaya had already been discharged, with no forwarding address or number. Kine had presumably picked him up and taken him somewhere.

Shizuo is dismayed. He had abandoned his phone in Sunshine City, and he’s pretty sure Izaya had too. He could text Shiki and ask him for Izaya’s new number, but maybe Izaya wouldn’t _want_ to see him? He could have left a message for him, after all. Maybe he had been hurt that Shizuo hadn’t come to visit or even called the hospital.

He goes for a walk along the harbour instead of going back to his room. The air is clean, the sea bright. He is _safe_ , he should be happy. Gradually he feels his spirits begin to lift.

He’s leaning against the railings, enjoying the view, when he’s accosted by two very familiar faces.

_“Shizuo!!!”_

They fall on him, and he hugs the twins as hard as they hug him.

It takes a while to interrupt their chatter. He sees at once that they haven’t been affected, that they would have been taken to safety at once and watched the rest unfurl on the news. He wonders why Izaya had thought they were dead. Perhaps he had been hallucinating.

“Your brother, I need to find you brother,” he says over their voices, forgetting his misgivings of Izaya not wanting to see him.

“He’s getting ice-cream,” Mairu says cheerfully. “I’ll tell him to get a fourth. Chocolate, right?” She barely pauses before running off.

Minutes later, far before Shizuo is prepared for him, Izaya is in front of him, an ice cream in each hand, while Mairu bears another two.

“Quick, they’re melting!”

They regard each other over the twins’ heads. Izaya looks tired. He greets Shizuo in a way that is not hostile but not exactly welcoming either. Perhaps it is a bad time, time he needs alone with his sisters, although they are behaving as if it is all a big holiday. They talk enough for both of them.

He and Izaya are finally left alone when the twins go to the bathroom, a moment he’d been both dreading and craving. They are also left with the twins’ remaining ice-cream in their spare hands, which diminishes the tension a little.

“How come you thought they were dead? All the kids were evacuated.”

“I don’t know,” Izaya frowns. “I don’t remember a lot of it very clearly. My last memory was breathing in a lot of smoke when people were running. It’s blurry after that.”

He goes quiet. He seems a lot quieter now, and Shizuo’s not sure if it’s an after effect of the gas, or a part of his personality Shizuo hasn’t seen before, or both.

“I was looking for you this morning,” Shizuo blurts. “At the hospital. Where are you staying?”

“I can’t remember.”

He transfers both ice-creams to one hand and fishes a hotel business card out of his pocket, scrawls 4 digits above the address.

“That’s my room.”

“Do you have the same phone number?

“No." 

He turns over the card and writes his number on the back of it. He is handing this to Shizuo when the twins come back and stare at them.

“Why are you giving Shizuo your phone number?”

“Finish your ice cream.”

-

It is an odd culture amongst the Ikebukuro-Shinjuku/Toshima ward crowd. Only a few have lost their homes, so the mood is mainly jovial: it is almost a free holiday. They live this non-life out there for a while and have survivor parties: barbecues, karaoke, hot pot, movie nights.

Shizuo tries to get into the party mood, but it doesn’t always work. He still feels a vague unease each time he looks in the direction of the Toshima ward over the bay, one that the others don’t share. He finds himself wishing Izaya were around.

That, and he has dreams of Izaya's shoulders against the observation deck windows, Izaya’s legs clutching his waist, Izaya’s fists knotted in his hair, while the darkness disguises the chaos below them. It should be a nightmarish memory but it isn't.

He has called the informant now and then, but he doesn’t always bother answering. No, that’s not fair. He must be busy. It’s not like he’s sitting around waiting for Shizuo to call.

Shizuo casually brings it up with Shinra one day.

“Oh yeah, I’ve seen him,” Shinra says cheerfully. “He even let me examine him. But he’s fine now. No trace of it left.”

“I saw him with his sisters once,” Shizuo says cautiously. “He seemed a little down.”

“Mm? Oh, I don’t know anything about that. I’m not that kind of doctor.” He gives a little laugh, but he avoids Shizuo’s eyes as he says it. “I’m sure he’s fine.” He changes the subject.

He speaks to Kadota, who at least appears to have made more effort to spend time with Izaya, only he apparently claims to be too tired to do anything.

Shizuo’s pondering this when he has a brainwave. He calls Izaya before he can chicken out.

“Hey, Izaya. How’s your aircon?”

“My aircon?” he repeats. “Fine, I guess. Why?”

“Mine’s shot and I’m baking in here. Can I come over?”

“So tell the building manager.”

“I have, I’ve been telling them for days. They keep saying an engineer will come out and it’s not happening. Can I come over for a bit? You’re only two blocks away from me.”

“I...I think they housed us by neighbourhood. Won’t Shinra be nearer?”

“Nope. I don’t know how they housed us, but you’re the closest. Please? You don’t have to entertain me or anything, I just need somewhere cool I can lie down and breathe.”

Izaya agrees, in a way that feels like it would less of a pleasure and more of too much effort to argue. He looks sleepy when he opens the door.

“Did I wake you up?”

“It’s all right, I’ve been sleeping funny.”

They lie side by side on an oversized hotel bed. The distance is weird after curling up together in Sunshine City.

“How’re you doing?” he asks Izaya.

“OK, I guess.”

“But you’re tired all the time?”

“Eh.” Shizuo feels him shrug. “It could be worse.”

-

The nap seems to do them both good. They wake up to early evening, the sky a unique shade of blue that’s between day and night, crowds starting to hit the bars and the seafront now the heat has waned.

Shizuo stretches and says casually, “Have you been to that seafood restaurant down by the harbour?”

“Huh? No, I haven’t.”

“I thought you would have. They do fatty tuna. Do you wanna go? I’m getting kind of hungry, and you said you don’t have much in.”

“Umm…” Izaya doesn’t have many excuses, having just napped out his tiredness and not having any food.

Shizuo manages to drag him out. It’s a beautiful night, a full moon reflecting on the sea, the harbour lights twinkling along their way.

The restaurant is quiet and relatively un-romantic, but the food is good and they get a table by the window.

“I’m sorry for the way I was, Shizuo,” Izaya says quietly. “And I don’t just mean what happened.”

“It’s OK,” Shizuo says. “All that seems so stupid now.”

The informant shakes his head.

“I made it so much harder than it had to be.”

“You were sick.”

“I was half sick, half asshole.”

“You’re all asshole,” Shizuo tells him, which makes him smile. “But I forgive you.”

It’s easier to talk after that.

“Did you get any gifts?” Izaya asks him.

“Gifts?”

Izaya nods.

“The bookstore sent me the books I'd been reading, free of charge. Some of them I already have, but still, it's a nice momento.”

“There's nothing for anyone to send me, except matches and cigarettes, which I shouldn't buy anyway.”

He actually hasn't had a cigarette since leaving Sunshine City. The sight of smoke makes him nauseous.

“I haven’t seen Simon or Dennis around,” Shizuo says. “Do you think they're OK?”  
  
“I called Simon. They're volunteering to help clean up the city. Apparently Russia Sushi’s in pretty good shape. It was only round the corner from Sunshine City, after all.”

“I’m never going to Sunshine City again,” he tells Izaya.

“Really?” he smiles. “I kind of want to see hapless tourists milling around where we fucked.”

Shizuo chuckles. He tells Izaya about Shiki wiping the tapes.

“Awww, really? I would have quite liked a copy.” Then he pauses. “Shiki knows?”

“Yeah. He was very...placid about the whole thing.”

“He’s like that. You could tell him aliens have descended, and he’d just sort of nod and give you a list of people to call. You’ve got to respect that.”

They talk some more, and Izaya insists on paying when they’ve finished.

As dates go - if it’s a date, it probably isn’t - it’s not bad.

They hit a bar on the way back, and then another one. Izaya seems to be coming back to life more and more as the night goes on.

Shizuo’s phone buzzes once, but he ignores it. He hopes they don’t bump into anyone they know, not because he doesn’t want to be seen with Izaya, but because he’s somehow enjoying himself and wants to be left in peace.

They pass Shizuo’s building on the way back, and neither of them mention him going up.

Back in the room, Izaya has barely shut the door before he is on Shizuo, dragging him down into a bliss that’s free from the excuse of madness or the end of the world.

-

Shizuo manages to stay the next day as well. He pesters Izaya into eating and going out more, even takes him along for hotpot, something everyone else wisely doesn’t comment on.

No-one is hostile to him, though. Some even seem grudgingly relieved that he’s all right.

 _-Were you really locked up with him all that time?_ Celty asks Shizuo privately. _How did you not kill him?_

“He was OK,” Shizuo says.

He finds the twins in a corner, sharing what he hopes is not a cocktail. Their heads are together, discussing something they look worried about. Their frown deepens when they see Shizuo.

“You and nii-san are on the news, Shizuo. We watched it properly this time.”

“Ah. Don't worry about that.”

They don’t look convinced.

“It said Nii-san was really sick.”

“Hey, they wouldn’t have discharged him if he’s not OK, I promise. And he goes to the hospital for weekly check-ups just to be sure.”

“How do you know?”

“How do I know…? Shinra told me,” he says, hoping he’s not blushing. He hates lying to them, but this isn’t a conversation he wants to have without Izaya’s permission.

They seem satisfied, so they move on to other things.

Shizuo finds Izaya afterwards, but before they can speak another familiar face makes them both stiffen. Akane.

“Izaya! Shizuo! I’m so glad you’re both OK!” She hugs them both, hard. She beams up at Izaya happily. “Shizuo told me you’re his best friend.”

“Did he,” Izaya says sheepishly, avoiding Shizuo’s eyes.

He looks uncomfortable as she chatters away. Shizuo gives his hand a reassuring squeeze. Akane doesn’t seem to notice. She probably holds hands with her own best friends and thinks nothing of it.

“Fuck,” Izaya says when she’s gone, and Shizuo doesn’t know if its relief or remorse.

The only person Shizuo avoids is Erika. He signals to Izaya to keep quiet when he hears her voice.

“I bet they totally did it,” Erika is saying, while the others groan. “Locked up together all that time, scared and lonely. They probably walked around naked. I bet they did it in the Planetarium under all the stars.”

“Why didn't we think of that,” Izaya grumbles.

“Shut up,” Shizuo hisses.

Shizuo’s had enough of other people for one night. He drags Izaya out by the hand, only half drunk, back to Izaya’s hotel.

“When did you move in, Shizu-chan?” he complains, but he smiles as he says it.

-

He does need his things though, so Izaya suggests they stop by next time they pass, and Shizuo stupidly forgets his lie about the aircon until Izaya is standing in the room at its pleasant temperature, the working vent’s happy buzz giving it away.

“I thought you said your aircon was broken,” Izaya says, as Shizuo freezes with his eyes comically wide.

“Oh, they, they must have fixed it,” he says lamely, and concentrates hard on finding a particular shirt.

Behind him, Izaya starts laughing. He laughs so hard he falls against Shizuo, and starts wrestling him on to the bed.

Shizuo reckons he got away with it.

-

When Shizuo later gets back to his room alone (Izaya has a meeting with Kine) he finds to his dismay that his aircon well and truly has broken. He has a hell of an afternoon.

Izaya laughs at him over this for a long time on the phone.

“So why are you still there?” He says, when he’s done. “Come over.”

“You didn’t let me finish,” Shizuo says, grinning. “I got a free upgrade. Luxury suite, top floor with seaview, champagne in the fridge. _And_ aircon. Why don’t _you_ come over?”

Izaya has already hung up.

-

He wakes up the next morning and reaches for Izaya, finds he’s not there. The informant’s voice comes from the foot of the bed.

“Good, you’re awake. Let’s go to the beach. I’ve slept enough for both of us.”

“That’s not how sleeping works,” Shizuo grumbles, rolling over.

Izaya however makes him coffee just the way he likes it, wafts it under his nose until he can resist no longer.

Half an hour later and he is in shorts and an open shirt, lying on a towel in the sand, in a secluded spot near the shade. Izaya is somewhere in the water. Shizuo had noted, with more satisfaction than jealousy, the number of heads that had turned to follow the informant’s progress, the girls wistful, men hungry.

Shizuo had also found out his new address that morning, an almost-new apartment complex bigger than his old place, same rent. It even had a bath. And, funnily enough it’s closer to Shinjuku than his old place.

He’s almost reluctant to leave this town though, and he knows the others feel the same. New friendships had been forged, a new gratitude and happiness for little things among them. And, he’ll miss the beach.

Shizuo closes his eyes in the sun and lies back for a long doze.

After a too short period of bliss, a shadow cools him and something is tossed on his bare chest.

“Have you not heard of skin cancer, Shizu-chan?”

Shizuo blinks up at Izaya, and then down at the sun lotion on his chest. The informant is soaking wet, his trunks clinging to him. He’s still slim, but good-looking once again rather than scary-looking. Shizuo grins up at him.

“Worried about me, Izaya-kun?”

He tackles Izaya’s legs lazily, who lets himself fall into Shizuo’s arms.

“Fuck, you’re cold,” Shizuo says, holding him anyway.

“You’re hot,” Izaya tells him. “Put the sunscreen on. I can practically smell your skin burning.”

“You put it on me if you’re so worried.”

He struggles upright. Shizuo sits up with him, but stops him from reaching for the bottle.

“You owe me, you know,” he says, encircling Izaya in his arms.

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

“I mean it. Dinner in a nice restaurant won’t cut it. You’re gonna have to be nice to me forever.”

Izaya laughs gently, places a hand over Shizuo’s.

“I think you may get bored of me before then.”

Shizuo frowns.

“No.”

“...OK. But no hard feelings if you do. Especially once everything’s back to normal.”

Shizuo turns Izaya around to face him. His tone had been half mocking, but his eyes are serious and sad.

“You are a pain in the ass,” Shizuo tells him. “Seriously. The bullshit you come up with. If the world really did end you’d probably survive, you and all the other pests.”

“You wish.”

He bites Shizuo’s lip to stop him talking, and Shizuo doesn't fight him.

**Author's Note:**

> Man, that took longer than I thought :D
> 
> I am not great with "dystopia"-like things, so hope this is all right.
> 
> Also the formatting got screwed up at some point and took an age to edit, so again I hope it's all right. I'm all edited-out right now.
> 
> Thank you!


End file.
